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TDWG Executive Committee Venue Decision
by Chuck Miller 16 May '12

16 May '12

To TDWG Members: The Executive Committee has been requested to comment regarding its decision to hold this year’s meeting in Beijing, China. Its Constitution establishes Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG) as “a not-for-profit, scientific and educational association formed to establish international collaboration among the creators, managers and users of biodiversity information so as to promote the wider and more effective dissemination of information about the world's heritage of biological organisms for the benefit of the world at large.” The Executive Committee’s decision to host the 2012 meeting in China was based on several factors: 1) A desire to more evenly spread the travel hardship and costs of the meeting around the globe over time, 2) A desire to enable attendees who otherwise would not have the resources to travel internationally,, 3) The Chinese Academy of Science’s offer to host the meeting in 2012, 4) Recent advances in biodiversity informatics in China (e.g. Catalogue of Life, Encyclopedia of Life), and 5) Interest in expanding “international collaboration” and “wider and more effective dissemination of information” through direct contact with the Chinese biodiversity informatics community in their local region, as has been done in other regions of the world in the past. The Executive Committee therefore decided last year to welcome the offer from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, which now expects at least 50 local attendees at this year’s meeting, the largest participation of Asian scientists in the history of TDWG meetings. Objections to holding the meeting in China have cited politically based reasons: “routine governmental suppression of internet connectivity on political grounds.” TDWG is a scientific and educational association, not a political one. TDWG comprises a global membership. Locating a TDWG meeting in a particular country does not imply an endorsement of that country's policies; it is instead an expression of TDWG’s purpose to collaborate to widely disseminate information for the benefit of the world at large. Further, there is no part of TDWG’s constitution, mission or purpose that implies or endorses isolationist, discriminatory, or punitive actions of any kind against anyone, any organization or any political entity. We look forward to your support to make this another successful and informative annual meeting and the opportunity to exchange cultures in an atmosphere of mutual respect and a common desire to make the world a better place for ourselves and future generations. Best regards, Chuck Miller, on behalf of the TDWG Executive Committee Chair Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG)

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Re: [tdwg] tdwg 2012 in inappropriate venue
by Annie Simpson 11 May '12

11 May '12

Dear Fellow TDWG members: Often the discussions on TDWG lists can overwhelm due to number of responses and depth of content. I am therefore astounded that there have been no replies to Bob Morris' well-thought-out and convincingly-delivered argument of 22-April (copied here below) about our 2012 meetings. I did not answer sooner under the assumption that there was discussion going on behind the scenes by the TDWG Executive. So far, crickets. I'd like to go on the record with a personal but hesitant response that does not reflect the views of my employer. I share Bob's concerns. What do the rest of you think? Annie Simpson From: Bob Morris <morris.bob(a)gmail.com> To: tdwg(a)lists.tdwg.org Date: 22/04/2012 15:22 Subject: [tdwg] tdwg 2012 in inappropriate venue Sent by: tdwg-bounces(a)lists.tdwg.org Dear fellow TDWG members, As I said publicly at TDWG 2011, I feel that it is inappropriate for an organization devoted to the open exchange of scientific data and information to hold a meeting in a country where there is routine governmental suppression of internet connectivity on political grounds. I personally would attend any scientific meeting in such a country except one by an organization like TDWG which should be taking a position about openness of access to information, and I hope others will join me in this position and publicly decline to attend TDWG 2012. Sometimes an argument is made in such cases that participation is a way to support the hosting organization, which in this case is eminent. But often just the opposite can result: the authorities will proudly say to themselves: "See, they come anyway." Bob Morris -- Robert A. Morris Emeritus Professor of Computer Science UMASS-Boston 100 Morrissey Blvd Boston, MA 02125-3390 IT Staff Filtered Push Project Harvard University Herbaria Harvard University email: morris.bob(a)gmail.com web: http://efg.cs.umb.edu/ web: http://etaxonomy.org/mw/FilteredPush http://www.cs.umb.edu/~ram === The content of this communication is made entirely on my own behalf and in no way should be deemed to express official positions of The University of Massachusetts at Boston or Harvard University. _______________________________________________ tdwg mailing list tdwg(a)lists.tdwg.org http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg

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Call for Challenge entries for iEvoBio conference
by Cellinese,Nico 10 May '12

10 May '12

Many trees enter. Fresh analysis ensues. New insights emerge. As a reminder, the iEvoBio conference is again holding a Challenge competition in 2012, this time on the theme, "Synthesizing Phylogenies." Further information on the nature of challenge entries and how to submit them can be found on the iEvoBio website at http://ievobio.org/challenge.html. Submissions are due by June 25, 2012. Cash prizes will be awarded for first place (USD 1,500) and runner-up entries. The winning entries will be selected by a vote of the iEvoBio meeting participants. Also, alongside the iEvoBio Challenge, 2012 iEvoBio sponsor Biomatters Ltd is running the Geneious Challenge. The goal of this challenge is to develop a new plugin to Geneious Pro, using the public API, that enables a new and exciting visualization or analysis. The winning entry will receive a $1000 cash prize, and all entrants who submit by the deadline will receive a 12-month subscription license. The deadline for the Geneious Challenge is the same as for the iEvoBio Challenge. Seehttp://ievobio.org/geneious_challenge.html for more information. More details about the iEvoBio conference and program are available at http://ievobio.org<http://ievobio.org/>. You can also find continuous updates on the conference's Twitter feed at http://twitter.com/iEvoBio and Google+ page, or subscribe to the low-traffic iEvoBio announcements mailing list at http://groups.google.com/group/ievobio-announce. iEvoBio 2012 is sponsored by the US National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (NESCent) and by Biomatters Ltd., in partnership with the Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE) and the Systematic Biologists (SSB). The iEvoBio 2012 Organizing Committee: Hilmar Lapp, US National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (chair) Robert Beiko, Dalhousie University Nico Cellinese, University of Florida Robert Guralnick, University of Colorado at Boulder Rebecca Kao, Denver Botanic Gardens Ellinor Michel, Natural History Museum, London Nadia Talent, Royal Ontario Museum Andrea Thomer, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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Job: NESCent User Interface Design and Web Application Developer
by Kristen Eisenberg 03 May '12

03 May '12

The National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (NESCent) seeks a creative and enthusiastic individual to design user interfaces and web applications for scientific applications. The incumbent will work as part of a small informatics team in close collaboration with domain scientists. NESCent (http://nescent.org) is an NSF-funded center dedicated to cross-disciplinary research in evolutionary science. Our informatics team works closely with visiting and resident scientists to support their custom software and database development needs. All NESCent software products are open-source, and the Center has a number of initiatives to actively promote collaborative development of community software resources (http://informatics.nescent.org). Above all, we are enthusiastic about our work, about the mission of the Center, and about the contribution of informatics to that mission. Kristen Eisenberg Billige Flüge Marketing GmbH Emanuelstr. 3, 10317 Berlin Deutschland Telefon: +49 (33) 5310967 Email: utebachmeier at gmail.com Site: http://flug.airego.de - Billige Flüge vergleichen

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Call for Software Bazaar entries open for Conference on Informatics for Phylogenetics, Evolution, and Biodiversity
by Cellinese,Nico 24 Apr '12

24 Apr '12

The Call for Software Bazaar entries is now open for the 2012 conference on Informatics for Phylogenetics, Evolution, and Biodiversity (iEvoBio), at http://ievobio.org/ocs2/index.php/ievobio/2012. See below for instructions. The Software Bazaar features presenters demonstrating their software live on a laptop. At iEvoBio, this session takes the place of a poster session, and will be approximately 2.0 hours in duration. Conference attendees will be able to walk from one demonstration to the next and talk with the presenters. Please also see our FAQ (http://ievobio.org/faq.html). Entries should be software aimed at advancing research in phylogenetics, evolution, and biodiversity, and can include interactive visualizations that have been pre-computed (such as SVGs, or Google Earth-compatible KML files). Note that commercial marketing activities are not permitted - presenters wishing to promote commercial or proprietary services or products should contact the Evolution conference about exhibitor space (http://www.confersense.ca/Evolution2012). Submissions consist of a title, which will typically be the name of the software (or visualization method) being presented, the URL of a website where more information can be obtained, and the license under which the source code is available. The website must contain a link to where the source code (and possibly binaries) can be downloaded. If it is not obvious from the website, the submission must describe what the software does. Reviewers will judge whether a submission is within scope of the conference (see above), and need to be able to verify whether the open-source requirement(*) is met. Presenters are expected to bring their own laptops for presentation, and any auxiliary devices necessary (such as a mouse). Power will be available at the presentation tables (110V/60Hz, US-style plugs; international presenters need to bring a suitable adaptor). Please let the organizing committee know as much in advance as possible if you expect to have unusually high demands for wireless network bandwidth, a large display, or other hardware. Review and acceptance of Software Bazaar submissions will be on a rolling basis. The deadline for submission is the morning of the first day of the conference (July 10), but, because space for Software Bazaar presentations is finite, we cannot guarantee the availability of slots for late submissions. We cannot accept submissions until the open-source requirements are met. Software Bazaar demonstrations are only 1 of 5 kinds of contributed content that iEvoBio will feature. The other 4 are: 1) Full talks (closed), 2) Lightning talks, 3) Challenge entries, and 4) Birds-of-a-Feather gatherings. The Calls for Challenge entries (http://ievobio.org/challenge.html) and Lightning Talks (same submission URL as above) remain open, and the Birds-of-a-Feather call is forthcoming. More details about the conference and program are available at http://ievobio.org<http://ievobio.org/>. You can also find continuous updates on the conference's Twitter feed at http://twitter.com/iEvoBio and Google+ page, or subscribe to the low-traffic iEvoBio announcements mailing list at http://groups.google.com/group/ievobio-announce. iEvoBio 2012 is sponsored by the US National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (NESCent) and by Biomatters Ltd., in partnership with the Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE) and the Systematic Biologists (SSB). The iEvoBio 2012 Organizing Committee: Hilmar Lapp, US National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (chair) Robert Beiko, Dalhousie University Nico Cellinese, University of Florida and Florida Museum of Natural History Robert Guralnick, University of Colorado at Boulder Rebecca Kao, Denver Botanic Gardens Ellinor Michel, Natural History Museum, London Nadia Talent, Royal Ontario Museum Andrea Thomer, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (*) iEvoBio and its sponsors are dedicated to promoting the practice and philosophy of Open Source software development (see http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php) and reuse within the research community. For this reason, software to be demonstrated to conference attendees must be licensed with a recognized Open Source License (see http://www.opensource.org/licenses/), and be available for download, including source code, by a tar/zip file accessed through ftp/http or through a widely used version control system like cvs, Subversion, git, Bazaar, or Mercurial. Authors are advised that non-compliant submissions must be revised to meet the requirement by July 8 at the latest, and in the event that presentation slots run out, precedence is established by the date they are first found in compliance, not the date of submission. _______________________________________________

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iDigBio announces open registration for July 12 workshop
by Austin Mast 24 Apr '12

24 Apr '12

iDigBio announces open registration for the Specimen Digitization Tools and Practices Workshop at the Botany 2012 Conference (http://www.botanyconference.org/). The workshop is designed to introduce current and future biological and paleontological specimen collections staff to resources and workflows that can lead to greater efficiencies in the digitization of their collections. The workshop is organized by iDigBio, the National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biological Collections. It will be held from 8:00 AM – 5:30 PM on Thursday, July 12, the day after the conference at the conference facility in Columbus, OH. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner for registered workshop participants will be provided. To register for the workshop, send an email by June 15 to Cathy Bester (cbester(a)flmnh.ufl.edu) that includes your name and institution as you would like them to appear on your name tag. iDigBio will accommodate as many participants as the budget permits. For a schedule and additional information visit https://www.idigbio.org/content/idigbio-botany-2012-digitization-workshop-o… iDigBio has also organized a symposium entitled “Building a High-Resolution, Specimen-Based Picture of Life: Possibilities and Challenges” for the Botany 2012 conference. It will be held on the afternoon of Wednesday, July 11, from 1:30-5:45. More details on the symposium are available at http://www.botanyconference.org/engine/search/?func=AbstractTitle&section=3…. iDigBio is the National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biological Collections (ADBC) funded by the National Science Foundation. The mission of iDigBio is to develop a national infrastructure that supports the vision of ADBC by overseeing implementation of standards and best practices for digitization; building and deploying a customized cloud computing environment for collections; recruiting and training personnel, including underserved groups; engaging the research community, collections community, citizen scientists, and the public through education and outreach activities; and planning for long-term sustainability of the national digitization effort. For more information, visit http://www.idigbio.org. With best regards, Austin Austin Mast Associate Professor Director of the Robert K. Godfrey Herbarium Member of the Steering Committee of iDigBio, The National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biological Collections Department of Biological Science 319 Stadium Drive Florida State University Tallahassee, FL 32306-4295 U.S.A. Office: King Life Science Building, room 4065 Lab: King Life Science Building, rooms 4068 and 4084 Herbarium: Biological Science Unit One, room 100 Voice: 1 (850) 645-1500 Fax: 1 (850) 645-8447 amast(a)bio.fsu.edu

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tdwg 2012 in inappropriate venue
by Bob Morris 22 Apr '12

22 Apr '12

Dear fellow TDWG members, As I said publicly at TDWG 2011, I feel that it is inappropriate for an organization devoted to the open exchange of scientific data and information to hold a meeting in a country where there is routine governmental suppression of internet connectivity on political grounds. I personally would attend any scientific meeting in such a country except one by an organization like TDWG which should be taking a position about openness of access to information, and I hope others will join me in this position and publicly decline to attend TDWG 2012. Sometimes an argument is made in such cases that participation is a way to support the hosting organization, which in this case is eminent. But often just the opposite can result: the authorities will proudly say to themselves: "See, they come anyway." Bob Morris -- Robert A. Morris Emeritus Professor of Computer Science UMASS-Boston 100 Morrissey Blvd Boston, MA 02125-3390 IT Staff Filtered Push Project Harvard University Herbaria Harvard University email: morris.bob(a)gmail.com web: http://efg.cs.umb.edu/ web: http://etaxonomy.org/mw/FilteredPush http://www.cs.umb.edu/~ram === The content of this communication is made entirely on my own behalf and in no way should be deemed to express official positions of The University of Massachusetts at Boston or Harvard University.

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Five years on: major conference on libraries and the Semantic Web, 27 April 2012 - Final announcement
by DCMI Announce 10 Apr '12

10 Apr '12

There are still places available for the Seminar “Five years on”, marking the five years of progress in library linked data since the “London Meeting” of 2007. The Seminar takes place on Friday 27 April 2012, 09.00/30 to 17.00. The venue for the Seminar is the British Library, St. Pancras, London. The final list of speakers for the Seminar includes: * Mikael Nilsson, Google * Edmund Chamberlain, Cambridge University Library * Alan Danskin, British Library * Barbara Tillett, Joint Steering Committee for the Development of RDA (JSC) * Robina Claphan, Europeana * Mirna Willer, IFLA ISBD Review Group * Pat Riva, IFLA FRBR Review Group * Thomas Baker, DCMI * Gordon Dunsire, IFLA Namespaces Technical Group and DCMI * Diane Hillmann, DCMI and Metadata Management Associates * Owen Stephens, JISC The London Meeting of 31 April/1 May 2007 stimulated significant development of Semantic Web representations of the major international bibliographic metadata models, including IFLA’s Functional Requirements family and the International Standard Bibliographic Description (ISBD), and MARC as well as RDA itself. Attention is now beginning to focus on the management and sustainability of this activity, and the development of high-level semantic and data structures to support library applications. Registration for the Seminar has been set at USD 190 (including VAT), which includes lunch and refreshments for two breaks. Further information and online registration is available at: http://dcevents.dublincore.org/index.php/BibData/fyo Please note that registration for the DCMI meetings on Thursday 26 April has now closed, as all places have been taken. Cheers, and apologies for cross-posting.

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NISO/DCMI Webinar with Dan Brickley: Schema.org and Linked Data
by DCMI Announce 03 Apr '12

03 Apr '12

***Please excuse the cross-posting*** =============================================================== NISO/DCMI Webinar: Schema.org and Linked Data: Complementary Approaches to Publishing Data PRESENTER: Dan Brickley DATE: April 25, 2012 TIME: 1:00pm - 2:30pm Eastern (17:00-18:30 UTC) INFORMATION & REGISTRATION: http://www.niso.org/news/events/2012/dcmi/linked_data/ =============================================================== ABOUT THE WEBINAR Schema.org--a collaboration of the Google, Yahoo!, and Bing search engines--provides a way to include structured data in Web pages. Since its introduction in June 2011, the Schema.org vocabulary has grown to cover descriptive terms for content such as movies, music, organizations, TV shows, products, locations, news items, and job listings. The goal of Schema.org is "to improve the display of search results, making it easier for people to find the right web pages." The Schema.org initiative has emerged as a focal point for publishers of structured data in Web pages, especially but not exclusively in the commercial sector. This webinar will explore how the publication methods of Schema.org relate to the methods used to publish Linked Data. Must data providers commit to one or the other, or can the two approaches exist side-by-side, even reinforcing each other? TOPICS AND SPEAKERS Dan Brickley is best known for his work on Web standards in the W3C community, where he helped create the Semantic Web project and many of its defining technologies. Dan is currently working on outreach activities related to the Schema.org initiative. Previous work included six years on the W3C technical staff, establishing ILRT's Semantic Web group at the University of Bristol, and more recently at Joost, an Internet TV start-up, and at the Vrije University Amsterdam. He has been involved with resource discovery metadata since 1994 when he published the first HTML Philosophy guide on the Web, and has been exploring distributed, collaborative approaches to "finding stuff" ever since. Thomas Baker, Chief Information Officer of the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, has recently co-chaired the W3C Semantic Web Deployment Working Group and the W3C Incubator Group on Library Linked Data. REGISTRATION Registration is per site (access for one computer) and closes at 12:00 pm Eastern (16:00 UTC) on April 25, 2012. Discounts are available for NISO and DCMI members and students. Can't make it on the webinar date/time? Register now and gain access to the recorded archive for one year. NISO/DCMI are holding four joint webinars in 2012. Register for three and receive the 4th for free. For more information and to register, visit the event webpage: http://www.niso.org/news/events/2012/dcmi/linked_data/

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Deadline extension for full talk abstracts for Conference on Informatics
by Cellinese,Nico 03 Apr '12

03 Apr '12

The deadline for submitting abstracts for full talks to the 2012 conference on Informatics for Phylogenetics, Evolution, and Biodiversity (iEvoBio) has been extended to Monday, April 9, 2012. We hope that this will give those interested in contributing sufficient time to do so. Please see http://bit.ly/iEvoBio2012_CfA for the full Call for Abstracts and author instructions. We still expect to be able to notify accepted talks in time for the early registration deadline of iEvoBio (and Evolution). More details about the program and guidelines for contributing content are available athttp://ievobio.org<http://ievobio.org/>. You can also find continuous updates on the conference's Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/iEvoBio) or Google Plus page (http://bit.ly/iEvoBio-on-Gplus), and there is a Google group you can join at http://groups.google.com/group/ievobio-announce to receive announcements. iEvoBio 2012 is sponsored by the US National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (NESCent) and by Biomatters Ltd., in partnership with the Society for the Study of Evolution (SSE) and the Society of Systematic Biologists (SSB). The iEvoBio 2012 Organizing Committee: Hilmar Lapp, US National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (chair) Robert Beiko, Dalhousie University Nico Cellinese, University of Florida and Florida Museum of Natural History Robert Guralnick, University of Colorado at Boulder Rebecca Kao, Denver Botanic Gardens Ellinor Michel, Natural History Museum, London Nadia Talent, Royal Ontario Museum Andrea Thomer, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

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